not afraid
by lunatic fringe
Summary: In a way, he had unofficially challenged her, and she did like a nice challenge. — originally written for a challenge on LJ; Nick & Sara.


**Title:** Not Afraid  
**Pairing:** Nick/Sara  
**Fandom:** CSI  
**Theme/Lyric Code:** T.20 (city lights)  
**Genre:** General  
**Rating:** I'd say G, but maybe PG since there is talk of drunk!Greg. :D  
**Warning:** N/A  
**Summary:** He had kind of unofficially challenged her, and she _did_ like a nice challenge.  
**Other:** For my original challenge for 40-mixed (with an underscore, not a hyphen) on LiveJournal. Never been to Vegas myself, so I'm going by what I've seen on CSI. Sara may be a little OOC, but I don't care. If she's not, then awesome, but if so, waaahhh. Suck it up — you're getting a cute scene anyway. ;D (premiered 03/08/06 at 607am.)

* * *

People didn't call Las Vegas "the City of Lights" for nothing.

At night, when you walked down The Strip, there were very few places where it was dark. Sometimes, when you were all absorbed in the brilliant neon signs and marquees, you could momentarily forget it was night... until you looked up at the sky. It was bright and flashy and with all those lights, it could be rather difficult to be secretive.

This was the place that Sara Sidle had begun to call home several years ago. However, she didn't venture out to the downtown of Vegas much — at least when it came to free time; if she was there, it was for a case. The last time she'd been there was when she, Warrick and Nick went out after the "chimera case", as they called it that very night.

And now she was there again, with the whole team. It had been Greg's suggestion — big surprise, of course — to go out, just to take a load off after a particularly grueling case. Imagine his surprise when even _Grissom_ agreed to this suggestion, and also agreed to join the rest of them... though only after Catherine convinced him that he should. "You don't get out _nearly_ enough, especially with 'the kids' and me," she had said as the aforementioned "kids" flanked her, and he'd grinned a bit and went along with it, replying with, "Yeah, I've been working too much."

Since her suspension nearly a year ago, Sara didn't drink much. Tonight, she'd been satisfied with a few virgin daiquiris. It was more fun to stay on the sidelines and watch Greg when he'd had a little too much to drink, anyway. At one point, Warrick and Nick even started to count how many times he got turned down by the women he tried to be smooth with. Yeah, that was _quite_ amusing. Maybe not for Greg, but for his co-workers, it sure was.

The night grew old fast, as Catherine had her daughter to get home to and everyone was starting to crave their elusive sleep. Everyone left until there was just Sara and Nick, who had arrived together, as Sara had suggested being the designated driver in case Nick had a little too much fun. But there was no need, as Nick hadn't had much to drink in the way of alcohol either.

As they walked down The Strip to the lot where Nick's vehicle was, Sara felt a twinge of deja vu. Grinning, she gently held onto Nick's arm, causing him to glance at her. She just kept that grin on her face when she looked back at him.

"Remember the last time I did this?"

"Yeah," Nick said, indeed remembering (and perhaps a little surprised that _she_ had). "I was confused. That was so unlike you."

"Oh? You don't think that there are people I feel totally comfortable with?"

"Nah, I know there are. But I didn't think you'd initiate physical contact... _in public_."

Sara gave him a look of mock disbelief. "Hey, for someone who's supposed to be my friend, you seem to have such little faith in me."

"Nuh-uh."

"Yeah-huh."

They continued on a few more steps, and then, stopping suddenly, Sara gently turned to him, then kissed him lightly on the lips — right there, out in the open, out in public. Pulling back, she smirked a little. "Mind you, we're in a well-lit area, with a lot of people around. And you know what? That didn't embarrass me _one bit_."

Though still a tad stunned by her action, Nick chuckled. "...You're just _full_ of surprises."

"I guess the lights of Vegas can make you do crazy things sometimes," she replied with a shrug.

* * *

**A/N:** Still moving things over from my writing journal 


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